Stranger Creatures 2: Bear's Edge

by Christina Lynn Lambert

  Hunter’s post ended with a promise to push his sources and anybody else he had to push until he found answers. Shayla could only hope that Hunter’s website and investigative efforts with Baron gave him something to channel his energy into. Maybe weird creatures did exist. Maybe the government did experiment on people, but whatever strangeness existed in the world, Shayla wasn’t part of it. Okay, that was not entirely true. She could do a few things she shouldn’t have been able to, but regenerating injured skin and body parts were not part of her skill set. She couldn’t turn into animals or set a building on fire the way some of the articles on Hunter’s page suggested some people could, while they walked around pretending to be ordinary. Shayla didn’t have the answers Hunter sought, and she hoped Hunter didn’t come to her looking for them. He belonged in her past.

  She had no desire to go to bed now after looking at Hunter’s freaky website. Grant didn’t ask her if she wanted him to stay—he found the popcorn in her cabinet and put a bag in the microwave while she chose a funny movie for them to watch. They ate obscene amounts of popcorn, chocolate, and fruit while Grant held her close, as if he could keep all the bad in the world away if he didn’t let go.

  * * * *

  Never pick up the phone when you’re so busy you wish you could clone yourself. A basic rule for anybody with common sense, and Shayla had absentmindedly violated it. Monday mornings were usually nuts, and that day was no exception. A protein bar and coffee sufficed as lunch, which she was currently taking at her desk while promising herself that she would hire a personal assistant to pick up some slack.

  Phone in hand, she finished her bite of a chewy peanut, granola, and dark chocolate bar and decided she would pretend to be the receptionist and transfer the call. If the caller wanted Shayla, she’d just hit the magic button to send the caller to her voice mail. Problem solved. Only not so because the caller recognized her voice, and it was the last person on earth Shayla wanted to talk to.

  “Shayla, this is Hunter Knowles.”

  “Hunter?” Crap! “Hey. What can I do for you?” And how soon can I get rid of you?

  “I know it’s been a long time. I just wanted to talk to you and first, to apologize for what happened.”

  Shayla huffed and pressed the Record button on her phone system. “What, for when you came after me with a knife screaming that you were going to prove I was immortal?” She hadn’t pressed charges. There’d been no witnesses. Hunter’s dad had found Shayla running from her dorm room after Hunter had tripped while trying to chase her. Hunter’s dad had believed Shayla’s story and had gotten Hunter admitted to a psychiatric facility for observation and agreed to make sure he transferred colleges and left her alone. She’d wanted Hunter to get better but couldn’t walk down that path with him, not after he’d run after her with a knife in his hand and crazy thoughts in his eyes.

  “’Cause you owe me a huge apology for trying to kill me. Or were you apologizing for letting Kendall Baron interview you so you could tell the world your dumbass theories that I’m superhuman or some supermedical freak?”

  Shayla was still irritated about the spin the whole thing had taken. Hope and Healing would benefit from the two-thousand-dollar donation that Baron had promised. Shayla had that part in writing, though she wondered what the interview would cost her in the long run. A few more minutes of talking to Hunter? Or worse?

  “You have every right to be angry.” His calm, placating tone made Shayla want to shove a pencil into his throat. “Truly I’m sorry for what you think happened in your dorm room.” Damn. She’d hoped he would say something she could use against him. Was he being clever in his avoidance, or had he convinced himself she’d made up the knife-chasing accusation? She wasn’t sure which would be worse. “Can we get together and talk about it?” He seriously had the nerve to ask her to meet with him?

  “No! Are you crazy?” Shit. Poor choice of words. She took a deep breath and reminded herself he was no longer her concern. “Sorry, Hunter, I didn’t mean that. I can forgive you for what happened when we were dating. I get that you had some problems, both mentally and physically, after you were beaten so badly. The brain injury, the drugs, the depression, and paranoia all made you do things you probably regret. I only wanted you to get help. That’s why I called your dad to come get when you started talking so strangely that night, and thank goodness he got there in time to keep you from killing me. The whole situation was cra—uh, messed up. But joining forces with the reporter who thinks I’m some kind of bionic medical mystery or mythical freak—Jesus, Hunter! You need help if you still believe that!”

  “I can see you’re pissed, but I’ve seen a few things since we parted ways, and I’m so close to proving it. Help me prove it, Shay. Come clean. You owe me this.”

  “I’ll tell you what, Hunter. I’m gonna give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you’ve really seen a few things that made you wonder if nightmares and monsters are made from real stories, but I’m not part of that world. When we were robbed, they went after you because you fought back.”

  That’s what had pissed off the guys who’d wanted a quick, easy grab of her and Hunter’s valuables. She couldn’t tell him she’d gotten up the courage to use her darker talents and had forced the men to leave before they killed Hunter. She’d been terrified she would start with one command and the power of her gift would overwhelm her until she went full-on psycho with it and started compelling people do whatever she wanted, however she wanted. No good could come of that.

  “I survived the bombing on the commuter van because people fell over me.” She took a deep breath, determined not to scream at him and not to hyperventilate. “I nearly suffocated to death under a pile of dead bodies, and in case you didn’t see the scars on my face during my interview or even on my company website profile picture, I didn’t come out of the bombing uninjured.”

  “The scars are for show. You know it, and I know it. There’s a group that has a type of drug that keeps your kind from healing. I bet you used some on your face to make your survival look legit, like you can really be hurt.”

  Yeah, right, because her face would so be her first choice for where to leave a visible scar. What a fucking idiot he was. “Hunter, I don’t know what else to say to you, but—”

  Her voice broke as she remembered the old Hunter—sweet, gentle, passionate, a little quirky, often forgetful, his brilliant mind often wandering away with plans and ideas. She had loved that Hunter, like a-house-and-babies-one-day kind of love, but that Hunter was gone forever. Or maybe this new Hunter had always been there, under the surface, waiting to be pushed. “Please honor what we had together by leaving me out of your conspiracy theories.”

  “So that’s a no? You won’t meet with me? You won’t help me expose a potentially unparalleled secret? Because if there’s technology or some way out there to heal people, to make people capable of surviving disasters and illness, you’re the most selfish person I ever met for keeping your secret.”

  Not the speech she’d been expecting. “You want to help people?” She’d thought he’d just started the monster hunt for the glory and for the answers.

  “Damn right, and I plan to make sure everyone has access, not just spoiled little rich girls like you.”

  She decided to let the “spoiled little rich girl” comment go. She hadn’t become a self-absorbed jerk until she’d gone out on her own and made her own money and her own career path. Shayla had changed for the better after putting her career-obsessed, workaholic ways behind her. She wasn’t perfect, but hey, she wasn’t stalking exes over the phone and trying to prove ridiculous conspiracy theories. She decided to let her own imperfections slide for the moment and just try to deal with Hunter so she could finish up all the shit she had to do to make it through her workday.

  “I agree with you. Everybody should have equal opportunity when it comes to health care, regardless of their financial situation, but what you’re implying, that I’m superhuman or that my daddy bought my w
ay into some medical-trial program, well, none of your theories are true. I wish you the best of luck in your…investigation, but I’m not meeting with you. I have no information to offer you.”

  “Shay, do you know what I do for a living?”

  “Design websites?” And sit around obsessing over fake news articles?

  “Designing websites is only a small part of my work. I can do anything with computers, including messing up the operations of a website, and so much more. Give me a call when you want it to stop.”

  The line went dead.

  Chapter Nine

  The weekend couldn’t arrive soon enough. Grant felt wrecked from trying to get as much work handled with his new business while training up a replacement for himself at Brass Cat. He had zero intentions of bringing work home with him over the weekend, and he’d asked Shayla to leave her work at the office too. Except, when he’d mentioned his desire for her not to bring any work home, it had come out sounding like an order. He’d been horrified at the bossy tone of his voice and how much the need to have her alone, all to himself, consumed him. She’d laughed and called him adorable. And agreed that he was right—no work on the weekends, just fun. Her sexy little smile had suggested she had exciting plans for their time together.

  Progress on one last lingering finance project was going smoothly, so he’d started to close out a file on the computer and go to lunch when a call came in to his cell phone—a nurse from Ward Jackson hospital in New Jersey looking for Cora Mitchell’s son. Grant braced himself for the worst, assuming his mother had just started using again and needed a couple of days in the hospital. Turned out, his mother had suffered a major heart attack. The nurse explained to him that his mother’s body was weak from so many years of drug use, and the situation didn’t look good. He drove up to New Jersey in a daze.

  At the hospital, he found his mother lying in a white-tiled, pink-walled hospital room, hooked up to several different beeping machines. She smiled weakly when she saw him. Grant opened the window and put the flowers he’d brought on the nightstand. There wasn’t much else he could do to chase the darkness from the room. He offered her a glass of water from the plastic pitcher by her bedside, and she drank a couple of sips while he held the cup for her.

  “Sit down,” she whispered. She’d been out of her latest rehab for six months, and lately she had seemed happy when they talked on the phone. She was in a program and trying to stay clean. Grant sent any money meant for his mom to a case worker who managed it for her so it would go to rent and food, not pills and heroin and alcohol. Some stupid part of Grant had hoped beyond hope that one day his mother would be able to stay clean and build a stable, successful life for herself.

  “I wasn’t using. I promise.” Her plea for him to believe her sounded so pitiful and weak, yet earnest.

  “I know,” he reassured her. “It’s okay. The nurse said it was a heart attack that got you sent here.”

  “Just in case I don’t have much time, there are a few things I need to say.” Her throat sounded raw, but she wouldn’t let him give her any more water. She shook her head when he tried to give her a spoonful of ice chips. Grant wasn’t sure if he should push the issue since her skin was dry and her lips were peeling.

  The nurse stroked his mom’s hair. “That’s okay, Cora. I’ll bring you some juice later.”

  His mom nodded. Before Grant could ask the nurse any questions, she slipped out of the room.

  When his mother spoke next, tears glimmered in her eyes. “I tried to do right by you. I wanted to do right by you, but I couldn’t. I was too messed up in my head. I’m sorry I couldn’t be a good mother. I think about that all the time now.”

  “Don’t worry about all that. Just rest. I turned out fine.” Well, close enough to fine. Sober, his mom didn’t miss much, including whatever minute expression he’d made while the disclaimer had played through his mind. “I really am all right, Mom. Maybe for a while I was kind of lost, but I found my way again. I just—I don’t know why it matters, but I need to know who my father is. It’s past time for me to find him.”

  His mom nodded and took a shaky breath. “He was a client when I lived in Los Angeles.” She looked away. Grant knew what she meant by client since his mother was not a lawyer, not a businesswoman, not a hairstylist—not anyone who would have had a professional clientele. Her customers would have been of a sketchier nature.

  “I moved to LA for the sun and the fun. I wanted to be a model and pay my way through college or buy a nice big house with all that modeling money. I got a couple commercials as an extra, but I got a job in a strip club and started making really good money there. There were some parties we could work, off the clock, to make extra money. I partied with the group one night and tried some things that made me forget about everything else I had planned for my life. Soon I wasn’t saving money for college. I was saving money for my new favorite things, heroin and coke.” She sniffled and wiped her eyes.

  “I kept going to the private parties, which led to other parties and more questionable clients who wanted more for their money. I wanted the money. There were a few of us hooked on buying our escape of choice, so I did what my clients asked.” She motioned for the glass of water, and Grant helped her, then used the towel next to the pitcher to wipe her mouth. “Your father was a client. Not one of my favorites. A lot of times, he got rough and mean. He was part of a small gang, trying to throw around the money at parties and gain some credit.”

  “So my father was some low-level loser in a gang?”

  She nodded, tears welling in her eyes. “A condom broke one night. He called me a bunch of names, then did a one-eighty and said maybe he ought to have a kid, that it could be his mini-assistant. After that, I refused to touch even a drop of alcohol or anything bad until I knew for sure that I wasn’t pregnant. Only, I was. He came to the club looking for me because apparently I had become one of his favorites, and I couldn’t take the chance that he would ever see me pregnant or see me walking down the street with you and put it together that you were his. I left LA because his gang started to gain some notoriety, and he moved up in the hierarchy. I had hoped he’d get caught and sent to jail or maybe killed. But neither of those things had happened by the time I left. I don’t know if they ever did. You look a lot like him. Always have.”

  Great, I look like a member of an LA gang. Nice. His mother hacked up a lungful of junk, and he wiped her mouth with the towel.

  “Anyway,” she continued, “I went back home to Ohio, but my parents kicked me out once my belly started to show, so I went as far away from LA as I could with only a little bit of money. That’s how I ended up in Jersey. My parents wouldn’t let me come back home when they saw you because you were…not fair-skinned like everybody else in their little town.”

  Too bad his grandparents were assholes, because it sounded like his mom could have used some help when she was scared and alone.

  “I know you don’t remember this, but for a while, things were good. We had a nice apartment, and I got a good job managing a restaurant. When the rent went up, I started stripping again, so I could keep a good life for us. People at the new club liked to party too, and I couldn’t say no. I tried. I stayed away from the hard stuff for a while, but then it found me. Over and over again.”

  She was crying softly now, and Grant didn’t know what to do to fix it, so he held her hand and wiped up her tears.

  “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” she kept telling him over and over until the words blended into one barely audible whisper. Her eyes closed, and her ragged breathing evened out. Grant pulled the covers up to her shoulders to let her sleep, but the machines emitted a noise that brought the nurses running in. The nurse who’d been in the room when he arrived ordered him to wait outside.

  Minutes later, the same nurse walked into the waiting room and motioned for him to step into the hallway. “Honey, I’m sorry, but your mom is gone.”

  Grant nodded. He couldn’t speak, but the nurse seemed to
understand he didn’t want a hug or platitudes.

  “Your mother knew that she might not leave the hospital. She told me that she wanted to be cremated, that coffins and gravesites freaked her out.”

  When he didn’t respond, she went on. “Wellby’s Funeral Home is about twenty minutes from here, and their reputation is solid. They can organize everything for you.”

  Grant breathed out a small sigh of relief at that. He had no fucking clue how to organize a funeral, or any other ceremony, for that matter. He walked out of the hospital with a white plastic bag that contained his mother’s wallet, keys, and shoes. Nobody else tried to help him or give him empty words of comfort. They just cleared a path.

  “Oh my gosh, that guy looks psychotic,” he overheard a woman in the waiting room comment to her friend.

  “Hot but scary. I mean, kill-you-in-the-alleyway scary. But I bet he’s a beast in bed,” her friend muttered to her. Grant entertained the idea of turning around and telling them to whisper more softly while he gave them a glimpse of the bear’s incisors and luminescent black eyes. For once, the bear was the reasonable one and pushed Grant out the door and into the parking lot.

  Grant sat in his truck, looking on his phone for a hotel room to book. He called Shayla instead. The sound of his rough, choked-up voice filled the truck. “Hey, baby doll.”

  “Hey, how’s your mom doing?”

  “She died.”

  Shayla gasped.

  He took a shaky breath. “I made it here in time to see her for a few minutes, and we got to talk before…” He couldn’t finish the sentence.

  “Oh, Grant, I’m so sorry.” He could hear in her voice that she hurt for him, and knowing that felt like having her arms wrapped around him.

  “Thanks. Shit, this feels weird. I hardly knew her outside of her being drunk and gone most of the time. Lately she seemed to be doing better, but I guess it was just too late. Too many years of using messed up her heart.”